


It's a Mirror and a Mirror Is All It Can Be

by CoraRey



Category: Cobra Kai (Web Series)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-14 13:07:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29419125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoraRey/pseuds/CoraRey
Summary: Their lives mirror each other more than they care to admit. Snipets of Daniel and Johnny's lives.
Relationships: Daniel LaRusso/Johnny Lawrence
Comments: 5
Kudos: 25





	It's a Mirror and a Mirror Is All It Can Be

**Author's Note:**

> Mentions of homopbhobic bullying in the first two snippets.
> 
> Title's from Bright Eyes's song A Scale, a Mirror and Those Indifferent Clocks, cause I suck at fic titles.

Daniel's 10 when he gets home and asks his mom what's a gay. 

\- Well, honey, a gay man is a man who doesn't want to marry a woman, he wants to marry a man.

\- You can marry another man?! - he asks and she's giving him that look she gives him when he plays soccer with boys much older than him and comes home bruised cause he can't help but trying to get the ball even if the opponents are twice his size. 

\- No, you can't. Why are you asking this? - she asks, trying to mask the worry in her voice. She's not very good at it.

\- No reason - he says, and turns around to go do kick-ups.

He wants to marry Jerry, he thinks, cause he always makes him laugh at class but he also wants to marry Alana, cause she always gives him half her sandwiches at recess. So Otto was wrong to say he's a gay. And he couldn't marry Jerry anyway, he just found out.

++++++++++++++

Johnny is 12 when he sees an older boy shoving a student against a wall.

\- What are you doing, man? Leave him alone - he says, less because he cares and more cause he's always itching for a fight.

\- What, you defending this faggot? - the guy says and Johnny sees the boy who's trapped against the wall is trying hard not to cry. The guy who's trapping him sees it too. - Geez, that's pathetic! You gonna cry like the faggot you are? 

\- Break it up, boys! - a teacher who's walking by says and the smaller guy runs away. He is crying now and everyone in the hallway can see it but no one seems to care.

Johnny doesn't know what a faggot is but he knows he doesn't want to be one.

* * *

\- I think the blonde's looking at you.

He noticed it. He's been looking at her too. But he doesn't usually talks to girls cause he still kinda wants to marry the guys who make him laugh at class and he doesn't want to find out how girls would react to that. He could always hide it, he supposes, but he's not good at that. The teacher at the Y said he used to telegraph his moves, letting the opponent know what he was about to do, always getting hurt cause that's what being open did to you. He goes to talk to the blonde anyway. By the time he's breathing in sand, he knows he won't give up on her. He's never been good at letting go of things that will blow up in his face.

++++++++++++++

It's not that Johnny doesn't miss Ali. He spent the week after their break up binge drinking and getting into fights and he thinks he might have been even kicked out by Sid if Bobby wasn't so good at talking to adults and making up excuses for why Johnny didn't sleep at home or why he was walking with a limp.

But a part of him feels relieved. Ali was native to the world they live in, while Johnny tried his best not to reveal himself as an unwelcome guest. Every move and gesture that came naturally to her was something he had learned and praticed and never felt natural no matter how many times he's done it. Apparently muscle memory only worked for fighting.

But seeing her at the beach stirs something inside him, pokes at that fear he always had that she would look at him and see he was Not Good Enough. He thought the fear would go away after it finally happened but now he's looking at her and feeling weak and breakable and he doesn't want to feel that way, so he heads to where she's at. 

He's trying to talk to her and she keeps shutting him down and this is how you're supposed to do things, adults always say you should _talk_ about your feelings and it's supposed to make it better and he's trying, he's _trying_ , "you promise you'll talk to me?" and he hopes it doesn't sound as pathetic as it did on his head but then she doesn't anyway and this punk comes out of nowhere, and it's one more thing for him to deal with when there's already so much _noise_ inside his head and hitting was always how he dealt with whatever was on his way.

* * *

Daniel starts having nightmares after the tournament. There's fear and there's Johnny and he can't see anything and he always wakes up in a panic, covered in cold sweat. Then one day he wakes up and realizes what these dreams are about. He's scared _for_ Johnny. The nightmares get worse after that.

++++++++++++++

Johnny dreams he's chasing Daniel, his blood pounding in his ears, and every night he has a stronger feeling that he has no idea what he'll do when he reaches him.

* * *

First time Daniel kisses a man it's warm and soft. He's been in a two-weeks training for this huge chain of stores he'll be working on, and there's a guy from Jersey and his name is Brian and when they're talking Daniel doesn't feel the need to hide his accent. Everyone goes to a bar to celebrate the end of the training and it's getting late and people start leaving, talking of early flights and suitcases to pack, and Daniel should feel relieved that he's home but he just kind of feels he's not going anywhere. At a certain point it's just him and Brian and they pay the tab and they're at the sidewalk and the sky's turning from blue to orange and Daniel's adult life is just around the corner and Brian leans in and it feels inevitable.

++++++++++++++

First time Johnny kisses a guy it's hard and rough. He's been having this feeling for months, this half-formed thought on his mind, so he goes to a seedy gay bar at the edge of town, drinks five beers and lets the first guy with whom he locks eyes on the badly lit dancefloor shove his tongue on his mouth. The guy's bigger than him and his beard kinda makes Johnny's skin burn. It's the furthest thing from soft. Johnny likes not having to try to be soft. He's never been good at it anyway.

* * *

He's in a hotel for some stupid conference on marketing techniques that's gonna suck three days out of his life. It's the first presentation of the first day and the monotone voice of the guy on stage is already lulling him to sleep. He startles, realizing he's slumping in his chair and half dreaming and looks around embarassed but no one has seemed to notice except for the guy next to him, who flashes him a genuine smile and then stares straight ahead. Daniel feels a pang of excitement, like he has an accomplice on some exciting, secret plot.

They run into each other that night at the hotel bar and the guy winks at him and they talk for hours and Daniel invites him to his room but changes his mind on the elevator. He calls Amanda, tells her everything that happened, doesn't know if he's asking for forgiveness or permission. She gives him both.

++++++++++++++

Johnny keeps waiting for it. _Cocksucker. Faggot._ Shannon never says it. She reminds him of all sorts of slights, both real and imaginary, and throws all sort of things at him, both physical and metaphorical. Never _that_ one, though. It's weirdly affirming.

* * *

Daniel sees him at the country club, and he gets a glimpse of a life where Johnny's been here every Christmas, clean shaved and in a suit, blissfully devoid of scars of any kind. His heart aches for this man who never came to be.

++++++++++++++

Johnny's not a kid anymore and he can be at the club without feeling like he's wearing someone else's skin. In fact, he thinks, no one who looks at him now will know how long it's been since he set foot in here or how he thought he would never be here again. No one except for Daniel. It feels kind of intimate.

* * *

Daniel pulls Kreese away from Johnny, elbows him in the nose, vaguely registers him running to the door while the sound of the sirens grows louder. He crouches besides Johnny, ignoring the glass on the floor, a litany of "Are you ok" spilling out of his mouth and there's a part of his brain that thinks the reason he's kissing Johnny is cause otherwise he'll start screaming.

++++++++++++++

Johnny's saying "I'm fine" over and over, but Daniel doesn't seem to listen and then Daniel's kissing him and Johnny kisses him back. He's vaguely aware of hot, sharp points of pain in his body and he wonders if he will ever have anything good in his life without almost dying first.

* * *

He's taking a shower with Amanda, trying to get the stentch of the police station and the hospital and the panic and the belated realization out of his skin.

\- I kissed Johnny - he starts, prepared to launch into the speech he's been rehearsing in his head.

\- About time! - Amanda says. - Can you pass me the soap?

++++++++++++++

Johnny's putting new sheets on his bed for Robby. Or Johnny's trying to put new sheets on his bed for Robby, despite a swollen hand and a deep cut in the other one.

\- Here, I'll do it - Robby says, but there's not any edge in his voice. - Are you sure you're alright? he says, but doesn't offer to sleep on the couch. They both know there's not much Johnny can offer him and that he needs to feel he at least could give his son a bed to sleep on. 

\- So - he says, feeling very much like he's about to ruin whatever precarious thing they have going on here - I kissed LaRusso.

\- That's....unexpected - Robby says and opens his closet. - Do you have like, a pillowcase that doesn't smell of beer?

\- You're not mad at me? - Johnny asks and Robby looks at him like he doesn't know if he should be amused or annoyed.

\- Please, dad! Like _that's_ the weirdest shit you ever did!

And Johnny hugs him, cause Robby just called him _dad_ and his son kinda just stands there but he says _I'm glad you didn't die_ and Johnny will take what he can get.

The couch is shit and everytime he moves something hurts. It doesn't even bother him.

++++++++++++++

When people ask them about their first kiss they mention the beach. Not the kiss that's tainted by Kreese and anger and revenge.

They tell the story of how they drove to a beach where they first laid eyes on each other and how they laid down their regrets at the sand and prayed they'd be washed away by the sea. 

Of how they felt that kiss was a long time coming and how they also felt they had beaten all the odds by being there.

Of how that kiss was the first of many.


End file.
